“What keeps you from giving now? Isn't the poor person there? Aren't your own warehouses full? Isn't the reward promised? The command is clear: the hungry person is dying now, the naked person is freezing now, the person in debt is beaten now-and you want to wait until tomorrow? "I'm not doing any harm," you say. "I just want to keep what I own, that's all." You own! You are like someone who sits down in a theater and keeps everyone else away, saying that what is there for everyone's use is your own...If everyone took only what they needed and gave the rest to those in need, there would be no such thing as rich and poor. After all, didn't you come into life naked, and won't you return naked to the earth? The bread in your cupboard belongs to the hungry person; the coat hanging unused in your closet belongs to the person who needs it; the shoes rotting in your closet belong to the person with no shoes; the money which you put in the bank belongs to the poor. You do wrong to everyone you could help, but fail to help. —Basil, fourth century.”
Quote by Thomas O'Gorman
Book:Advent Sourcebook
Work
Advent Sourcebook
Browse quotes and source details for this work. more
Author
You May Also Like
“I don't write on revolution, I am the revolution.”
Source: Handcrafted Humanity: 100 Sonnets For A Blunderful World
Source: Utopia for Realists: How We Can Build the Ideal World
Source: Uncomfortable Conversations With a Black Man
Source: Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents
Source: The Black Kids
Source: Real Tigers
Source: Privilege, Power, and Difference
Source: Aftershocks
“Industry is not the sign of advancement, equality is.”
Source: Neden Türk: The Gospel of Secularism